


The Mark in His Arm

by Innwich



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Angst, M/M, Self-Harm, Soul Bond, Soulmate-Identifying Marks, Soulmates
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-22
Updated: 2014-09-22
Packaged: 2018-02-18 08:53:12
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,220
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2342498
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Innwich/pseuds/Innwich
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dean hated his soulmark. He didn’t know anyone whose mark hurt as bad as his did.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Mark in His Arm

Everyone had a soulmate. There was no exception.

That was what Mary said when Dean asked her about the wavy line on the back of her hand.

“Dad has that too,” Dean said. “Are you and Dad soulmates?”

“We are,” Mary said.

“How will I know if someone is my soulmate?” Dean said.

Mary touched the small irregular mark on Dean’s arm. “They may turn up in the most unexpected of places, Dean, but you’ll know when you find them. Trust me.”

“But how will I know it’s them?” Dean said.

Her eyes twinkled. “You’ll know.”

\- - -

Dean lay on the ratty couch in Bobby’s living room, letting his head lolled back against the backrest.

He squeezed the muscles in his arm and winced as he felt another spasm coming from his mark. He could actually feel his muscle bunched up and twitched uselessly under his skin.

He was twelve years old; he shouldn’t be whimpering because of a stupid mark.

“Is it that time of the month again?” Sam smirked. He was perched on the armrest of the couch, his short legs dangling off the floor.

“It’s not funny,” Dean said through his gritted teeth. “It hurts.”

“I don’t know many people that have it as bad as you do,” Bobby said. “Do you need to see a doctor, boy?”

“I’m fine,” Dean said through gritted teeth. “It’s happened before. It’ll pass.”

“Is it supposed to hurt like this, Uncle Bobby?” Sam said.

“It’s different for everyone,” Bobby said, looking unsure. “But the soulbond has to be pretty strong if it’s affecting Dean like this.”

“Will it hurt less if Dean finds his soulmate?”

“Of course. Pain will be the last thing Dean feels when he finds his soulmate,” Bobby said. “Hasn’t John told you boys anything?”

“No,” Sam said.

“Dammit, it should be your dad helping you with this,” Bobby muttered.

The mark kept Dean awake for nights whenever it acted up.

Dean learnt early on how to write with his left hand, because he could barely hold onto a pencil when his arm cramped. He needed to be ambidextrous if he wanted to feed himself without spilling food over himself.

He’d tried everything, from heat pads and massages to most prescription drugs that he could get his hands on. The most that any of it did was to take off the edge of the pain.

He borrowed books from libraries to find out what else he could do, but the only books he found were about predicting what kind of soulmates you would have based on the shape of your mark, which Dean had zero use for.

He even prayed to find his soulmate, just to make the mark stop hurting. He prayed long and hard for two months.

He stopped after the cramps left huge purple bruises on his arm.

Despite the hot summer sun, Dean wore long-sleeved T-shirt to school, in case someone thought John was hitting him and tried to take him and Sam away.

\- - -

Dean had been to most states in the country.

If anyone should have found their soulmate by now, it would be Dean, but his mark was still aching when he was sixteen.

“I will help you find your soulmate, Dean,” Sam said.

“Sure you will, short stuff,” Dean said.

That was how Dean ended up speed-dating most of the girls and boys in his class.

None of them was his soulmate.

Not that Dean minded, because he found some great hookups.

It didn’t matter that his mark didn’t match theirs. If there was one thing that Dean, it was how to get into people’s pants. High schools were filled with teenaged horndogs that wouldn’t wait for their dicks or boobs to stop growing before they had sex, let alone for some mysterious soulmate to show up and pop their cherry.

\- - -

After another week of sleepless nights filled with spasm and cramps and soaked covers, Dean decided to take matters into his own hands.

John was on a hunting trip, and Sam was hanging out with friends from school.

Dean took a hunting knife with him into the bathroom. He pulled up his sleeve and bared the soulmark on his arm.

He didn’t have to cut a lot. He only had to slice off the flesh that the mark was attached to. He just had to be careful not to cut through any arteries or nerves. He’d looked it up in medical books, and he was pretty sure he wouldn’t end up with a crippled arm after this.

Like sixty per cent sure.

Dean bit down on the rag in his mouth, and started cutting.

It was agonizing. Damp patches started to form on the back of his shirt, as blood trickled down his arm.

Dean was halfway through when Sam picked the lock and took the knife from him.

Sam called the ambulance despite Dean begging him not to.

A doctor stitched Dean up, and made Dean stay at the hospital for a fortnight.

The nurses looked at him with pitying eyes when they handed him his watery porridge and jello. He knew what they were thinking and they were wrong: He wasn’t one of those emo kids that sliced up their soulmark after a shitty day.

He’d only tried to do what no doctor in the world would’ve agreed to do for him.

He didn’t need to be put on suicide watch.

“Why would you do something so stupid?” Sam said with wet eyes, sitting by Dean’s bedside.

Dean sighed. “I just don’t want to hurt anymore, Sammy.”

After the stitches were removed, Dean’s soulmark looked as good as new.

It hurt like a bitch for an entire week afterwards.

\- - -

Dean ate, slept, drove, screwed, and hunted his way through the country.

In every town and every street that he passed, Dean stayed on the lookout for his soulmate, the one that his soulmark would never let him forgot was out there.

The one who could take away the pain.

\- - -

Amidst the gore and the torture and horror Dean had seen in Hell, he couldn’t remember if the soulmark was responsible for part of the daily pain that was dealt to him.

But, hey, it was Hell; his mark probably followed him all the way down there.

When Dean woke up in pitch blackness, in a coffin under a few feet of dirt, the first thing he felt was the twitching of the mark under his T-shirt.

\- - -

A man in a trench coat strolled into the barn.

He was powerful enough to blow the lights out with his mind. Bulbs burst and sparks rained down on him.

Monsters sure liked their dramatic entrances.

Dean raised his sawed-off shotgun, and fired at the thing that pulled him out of Hell. He nearly missed when the mark twitched in his arm again, as it always did. 

It still hurt like a bitch.

\- - -

Cas was grumpy for an angel.

He was also hot.

Not for the first time, gazing at Cas’s parched lips, Dean wondered if angels bought into the whole ‘thou shalt not sleep with thy neighbor’s soulmate’ drivel.

\- - -

Cas popped up in the middle of the room, returning from another one of his searches for God.

“Are you hurt?” Cas said.

“Hello to you too,” Dean said, looking up from the laptop where he was typing one-handedly. He had a heat pack wrapped around his right arm.

“He’s having soulmark cramps,” Sam said helpfully.

“Any chances you can mojo me better, Cas?” Dean said. “I’d love to use my right hand in the shower again, if you know what I mean.”

Sam groaned. “I don’t need to hear that, dude.” 

Cas lay a hand on Dean’s shoulder. He frowned, as he concentrated hard. After a full minute had passed, Cas let go. Dean could still feel his bicep contracting violently under the heat pack. Cas said, “I’m sorry, Dean. The mark is connected to your soul. I can’t do anything about the pain it causes.”

“Friggin’ great,” Dean muttered. “I hate this thing.”

“You shouldn’t say that,” Cas said stiffly. “It’s a blessing to have a soulmark.”

“Breaking my arm would hurt less than the cramps it’s giving me, Cas. You can have it if you want it.”

“You’ll change your tune when you find your soulmate,” Cas said.

Dean snorted. “I doubt that.”

“Do you know who Dean’s soulmate is, Cas?” Sam said.

“No, I’m not privy to Heaven’s secrets, as you well know,” Cas said. The bruised bags under his eyes stood out against his pale skin. “Otherwise I’d have known about Heaven’s plans to set Lucifer free”

“Yeah,” Dean said. “Sucks for us.”

\- - -

After the sixth time Dean caught Cas staring at his mouth before Cas quickly looked away, he knew his feelings for the angel wasn’t unreturned.

Cas had always stood too close to him.

In the end, it was a promise to help Cas lose his virginity, that sent Dean onto his knees and taking Cas into his mouth.

And once Dean got a taste, he couldn’t stop.

\- - -

“So, I’m guessing you have a soulmate, huh?” Dean said, trying for casual. It wasn’t difficult, since he was still lose and sloppy and high on the rush of having had an orgasm.

Cas paused in the middle of pulling on his pants. He always put on his clothes as soon as he and Dean were done. Dean wasn’t complaining; he liked the view. Dean just didn’t know why Cas was in such a hurry to leave.

“This is not my mark,” Cas said. He touched the mark on his collarbone. It was shaped like a circle of linked rings, nothing like the jagged mark on Dean’s arm. “It’s Jimmy’s, though his soul is gone from this body.”

“Did Jimmy find his soulmate?”

“Yes,” Cas said. “He found his wife at church at the tender age of seven.”

“Wow, isn’t that a little young?” Dean said.

“It’s fate.” Cas shot him a glance. “You’ll find your soulmate someday too, Dean.”

“Yeah, I heard you the first dozen times you said that,” Dean said. “Do you have a kink for it or something, Cas?”

“I just want you to see it as the blessing that it is,” Cas said. “Angels don’t have soulmates or soulmarks.”

“What?” Dean said, frowning. Everyone had a soulmate, even the shittiest and most evil sons of bitches in the world had soulmates. “Why the hell not?”

“Angels don’t have souls, Dean,” Cas said, buttoning his shirt. He shrugged on his suit jacket and his trench coat, before pressing a quick kiss on Dean’s forehead. “I should resume my search for God.”

The bed creaked as Cas flew off and his weight was lifted from the mattress.

Dean lay on the bed, left alone with his thoughts and cooling lube in his ass.

He wished Cas would stop leaving so soon every time after they had sex.

\- - -

One night, Dean walked in on Cas standing naked in front of the mirror in the bathroom and glaring at his own reflection.

“Do you mind? I really need to take a leak,” Dean said.

Cas didn’t move.

Dean rolled his eyes, and pushed past Cas. The bathroom was big enough for the two of them. Dean sighed contently as he relieved himself. There was nothing like emptying a full bladder after a nice nap.

By the time Dean went to wash his hands, Castiel was trying to contort his own body in a way that he could look at his back in the mirror.

“What are you doing?” Dean said. “Don’t tell me you’re turning into narcissist.”

“I’m becoming human, Dean. I’m thinking perhaps I’ll get more than a soul in my fall.”

“You looking for a soulmark?”

Cas grumbled unhappily. “I don’t have a mark.”

“Trust me, I would’ve noticed if a mark popped up on your body.” Dean hesitated, because it was never good when soulmarks were brought up by someone that he’d been screwing. He’d had too many breakups that began with them talking about how different their soulmarks were and ended with him walking out of someone’s door. “Is it gonna be a problem?”

“No,” Cas said, dropping his gaze. “It’s not a problem.”

“Good.” Dean dipped his head and mouthed at the mark on Cas’s collar bone. “‘Cause I really want to do this.”

“Dean,” Cas said, biting off a moan, and clutched at Dean’s shoulders. The sound sent a spark of heat to Dean’s groin. Dean couldn’t wait to see what other noses he could wrung out of Cas.

Dean kept his mouth on Cas, running his tongue along the ridges of the mark, as he hoisted Cas up onto the edge of the sank.

\- - -

Cas stopped leaving after he lost his grace completely.

Dean was slowly getting used to finding Cas in his bed in the mornings.

But more often than not, Cas had his back turned to Dean, curling into himself, his spine rigid line of bones under tanned skin.

This morning was no different. Dean ran a hand down Cas’s back, and felt Cas stiffened.

Dean could read rejection when he saw it.

He got out of bed quietly and went to get breakfast from the nearest diner.

\- - -

Dean stopped the Apocalypse, and lost Sam to the Cage.

Cas appeared in the passenger seat, when Dean was driving away from Stull Cemetery, the memory of Sam falling into Hell still burnt into his mind’s eye.

“What now, Cas?” Dean said. “You going back to Heaven and be the new sheriff in town?”

“It seems like the right thing to do,” Cas said.

“Yeah, you’ve gotten back your halo and you wings,” Dean said. “So why the hell not go back to the douchenozzles that has been trying to kill all of us for the last two years?”

“You’re angry.”

“No shit. Sam’s gone, and you’re leaving me again like I’m nothing more than your friggin’ booty call.”

Cas bowed his head. “That’s not true.”

“I’m sick of your mixed signals, man.” Dean punched the steering wheel. Cas pursed his lips, but still stubbornly sitting in the car. Dean said, “What do you want?”

“You should look for your soulmate, Dean,” Cas said slowly.

Dean laughed shortly. “You’re a broken record, you know that?”

“There is someone out there for you,” Cas said. “Someone that is perfect for you. You should find them.”

“Do I look like the kind of guy who is into that?”

“You used to pray to find your soulmate,” Cas said. “I heard you, Dean. I heard every one of your prayers.”

“I just wanted my mark to stop hurting, Cas,” Dean said. “It isn’t a good reason to have a relationship.”

“After I fell, I thought I might be your soulmate,” Cas said, not looking at Dean. “I’m sorry I don’t bear your mark. Angels aren’t meant to have soulmates.”

Dean swallowed drily. Impossibly, he allowed himself to hope. “What are you talking about?”

“I’d never ask you to give up your soulmate for me, Dean,” Cas said. “But I was too selfish to stay away for long.”

“Don’t say that, Cas.”

“The Apocalypse is averted,” Cas said. “Go and find your soulmate, Dean.”

“Cas-“

But Cas had his mojo and wings back, and Dean was never any good at stopping him from leaving.

Dean drove. His wounds might have been healed, but he could still feel the phantom pain of split skin and broken bones, and the ache of the loss of something important.

\- - -

During the year after Sam’s fall into Hell, Dean stopped hunting.

Dean had never done this before. He drove across the country, like those kids that took a gap year before going to college, for no other purpose than to search for the person on the other end of his soulbond. He even signed up for every soulmate-matching website on the Internet.

Dean didn’t find his soulmate. He got nothing from his search.

But he’d done his part. No one could say he hadn’t tried.

In a small seaside town in the south of Florida, Dean parked the Impala by a rocky beach. It wasn’t too sunny, but there was a warm breeze coming in from the sea. Dean inhaled the scent of sea salt as he sat on the hood of the Impala. He prayed, “Get your ass down here, Cas. I need to talk to you.”

“Dean,” Cas said. He was still dressed in the trench coat and rumpled suit, looking exactly like when he left Dean a year ago. “What is it?”

“I’ve looked for my soulmate, like you told me to. Are you happy now?”

“You may not have found them, but your soulmate is still out there, Dean,” Cas insisted. “I know that much.”

“I don’t care. I’m not looking anymore.”

Dean knew, without his soulmate, his mark would ache with a pain that crippled his arm every month. It would hurt so bad that Dean would whimper into Cas’s shoulder, and Cas would have to hold him through countless nights of pain and sweat.

Actually, it didn’t sound so bad.

“This is the friggin’ end of the line for me, Cas. Journeys ending and lovers meeting and all that sappy crap.”

“Dean…”

“Because screw destiny. I’ll always choose you, over everyone out there in the world.”

“And what are you asking of me?” Cas said lowly.

“I’m asking you to stay,” Dean said, “and we’ll make our own fate together.”

Cas studied Dean’s face for a long time. Finally, he took Dean’s hand in his, and said, “I’d like that very much.”

\- - -

**Epilogue**

Years later, Dean broke into an art collector’s mansion. He followed the path of debris, killing two demons that stood in his way, until he reached a large display room where the Knight of Hell was waiting.

He was only here because Crowley caught wind of Abaddon wanting something from here. The smug son of a bitch didn’t want to get his own hands dirty.

“Have you come to die, Dean?” Abaddon said, standing before a shattered glass case.

Inside the case was a bony knife carved from an animal’s jaw. Dull round teeth gleamed at the edge of the blade.

Dean couldn’t look away from it. As absurd as this was, he swore he could hear the blade calling to him. It had the voice of mermaids and it sang in the language of sirens. It was a part of him that he’d lost a long time ago.

They were the sea and the earth, they were bone and flesh; they were made to be together.

Dean unclenched his hand. With a little concentration, he summoned the blade. It flew past Abaddon and straight into his palm. His hand fit perfectly around the hilt.

Abaddon backed away, staring at him. “That’s impossible.”

Dean grinned. His mark glowed with the heat of a small sun. There had never been so much raw power coursing through him before. It raced through his veins and filled his core. This must be what Cas felt when he was juiced up on angel grace. 

For the first time in Dean’s life, he felt something other than pain from his mark.

It was awesome.

Dean tightened his grip on the blade. “Think again, bitch.”


End file.
